[Assam] BETWEEN THE LINES--from the Sentinel

[Chan Mahanta]

Ram posted : [Assam] India Has Arrived

I am glad to hear it has. Question is where :-)? The following 
appeared in the Sentinel a couple of days back.

cm









BETWEEN THE LINES
  Price of Development
Kuldip Nayar


B udgets in the early years of independence were an
  enigma wrapped in secrecy. India's economic base
  was limited. The dependence was, therefore, on
  the ingenuity of finance minister. Crises could not be pulled out of 
a hat to maintain the morale. Yet he would do the rope trick because 
the government's popularity depended on that. The haves grumbled over 
fewer benefits than before but realised that they still had enough. 
Other people did not count in the scheme of things. The growth rate 
averaged 3.5 per cent annually but it did not disturb anybody's 
sleep. The debate after the budget would not be whether the proposals 
had merit but whether they gave the country an ideological tilt, 
close as we were to the culmination of freedom struggle.
  One point that evoked discussion was the distance between Jawaharlal 
Nehru's way of development, the socialistic pattern with the state 
playing prime role, and Mahatma Gandhi's concept of self-sufficient 
countryside without interference by the state. Over the years, the 
first became urban in character and the second rural. One got 
associated with the growth, however slow and slovenly, and the other 
with values and idealism.
  The first has manifested itself through consumerism. The other has 
got stuck in simple but marginalised living. One has all the opulence 
and wasteful expenditure whereas the other has all its adverse 
fallout: poverty and neglect. Nehru's associates, lessening day by 
day, still talk radical and they recall the period from Karl Marx to 
Harold Laski. But the Gandhian followers, close to the ground, have 
grown skeptical of ideologies which draw inspiration from abroad. New 
India has moved away from it and the governance is directed towards 
higher growth through globalization or whatever the means.
  It is difficult to run away from the plazas, the malls and the new 
eating places. But of what use they are or the multi-storey 
buildings, big dams and foreign direct investments when at least 300 
million people, more than the entire middle class, are destitute? 
Those who live below the poverty line are roughly 400 million, 
official figures testify.
  All budget speeches - Finance Minister Chidambaram's are no 
exception - applaud the role of the farmer or small man. But there is 
very little left for him when the real beneficiaries have eaten from 
the plate. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has been promising the 
countryside a good deal for some time now. But agricultural growth is 
stagnant. The import of food grains is, in fact, ominous. Rural 
unemployment is rampant. Farmers are committing suicide, not only in 
Andhra Pradesh and Kerala but in the soya-belt of Punjab and the 
cotton-growing areas of Maharashtra. It has been noticed at many 
places in the countryside the students leaving schools and colleges 
and opting for work on the fields.
  There is a loud demand for another Green Revolution. But this may 
well be wishful thinking. Farmers have no money to invest in land to 
make it productive. The corporate sector, if given a chance, will 
convert it into another industry, changing the very ethos of the 
countryside. Land is for people, not people for land. Bhoodan (gift 
of land) did not work. Even what was offered was being reclaimed. 
Even in the distribution of bhoodan land, an element of corruption 
had crept in. No inquiry was ordered because some important people 
were suspect.
  The Employment Guarantee Scheme that the government has introduced 
in 200 districts is only a palliative, not a solution. The government 
has yet to spell out specific schemes for employment. However, the 
budget on defence and security has been increasing year after year. 
The explanation is that the naxalites and the desperate people in 
Kashmir and the north-east are to blame. Pakistan also comes into the 
picture. Maybe, the reading is correct to some extent. But what about 
the causes that are responsible for the deterioration of the economic 
condition? The budget is of little help to those who are at the lower 
rung. The government says that it has no money. But its bureaucracy 
is bloating and the non-plan expenditure increasing.
  Have our priorities been wrong? The first five-year plan which Nehru 
formulated was to industrialise the country so as to lessen its 
dependence on land which is a victim of whimsical monsoons. Some may 
interpret it as a scientific approach. But it has been left half way. 
Services have done better than industry. On the other hand, people 
living in villages, India's two-thirds of population, have been left 
high and dry. Nehru initiated land reforms and had to amend the 
Constitution - it was India's first Constitution amendment after 
independence - to implement them.
  Still, he could not give land to the tiller free. All that he did 
was to put a ceiling on the individual's holding: 18 acres per 
family. Sheikh Abdullah in Jammu and Kashmir was the only one in the 
country who gave land to the tiller without compensation. Nehru 
wanted to emulate him but he could not do so because the Congress was 
dominated by kulaks. The landed aristocracy still plays an important 
role in the party.
  True, there is a case for constituting a commission to go into the 
land reforms. But does the government have the guts to do so? Vested 
interests in the party will not allow that to happen. Nonetheless, 
with land getting divided and re-divided among children and their 
children, there is a fragmentation of holdings all over the country. 
This affects food production as well. Some way must be found to 
redistribute the land.
  As things are today, discontentment will grow. Already, the dalits, 
the tribals and the marginalised farmers are migrating from their 
village in search of job. The basic fact that India must face is: it 
has not enough land for the people who depend on it. The countryside 
can be made attractive. The best schools can be opened there. It does 
not matter if teachers are given salaries five times more than they 
get in cities. The standard of teaching should be so high that 
students from cities could prefer to travel to the countryside for 
studies there. Not only teachers but doctors should also be tempted 
to go to villages. Salaries should not come in the way. The purpose 
is to focus attention on the countryside where most people live.
  We talk of the good of society. Is this something apart from and 
transcending the good of the individuals composing it? We may mock at 
the Gandhian values. But what type of society is it where the 
individual is "ignored?" Whatever name we may give it, the progress, 
however impressive, is creating more and more disparities. Probably, 
this is the price the development of sorts exacts. Can we pursue this 
path without peril?